even ended up buying 2 copies of a theme deck because the two singles I need on their own are worth roughly as much as the decks which contain them along with 58 other cards, which is useful if I ever decide to run greninja break (not likely lol greninja sucks)

I'd argue it's significantly cheaper to enter TCG since you 'only' need a 3DS and a copy of the game, whereas my deck is probably about £200 all in (even if you buy singles) when you count sleeves and eton mess. And with a new set every three months that's an ongoing cost, whereas there's only a new game every couple of years.

It's more just still a bit daft that TPC charge higher entry fees to VGC and skew all the prize support so heavily in favour of the TCG.

One of the nice things about playing VGC was its lack of real cost but ever since they started doing this it's just not worth it when you could just play a properly engaging game instead and still end up less out of pocket.

And I looked, and behold, a pale horse! And its rider’s name was Death